A diver captured footage of an unusual-looking jellyfish off the coast of Papua New Guinea late last year, with researchers now suggesting it could be a new species.

The video was captured by Dorian Borcherds in late December. He owns Scuba Ventures in Kavieng, in late December.

Borcherds sent the footage to his wife in South Africa, who uploaded it to the Jellyfish app, a project Dr Lisa-Ann Gershwin, a jellyfish expert at Australian Marine Stinger Advisory Services, co-founded.

Gershwin says as soon as she saw the footage, she almost fell out of her chair.